With increasing air traffic, and increasingly busy airports, managing terminal area traffic both in the air and on the ground in a manner that is both safe and efficient is desirable. With regard to terminal area traffic, any unauthorized intrusion onto a runway, regardless of whether an aircraft presents a potential conflict or not, is deemed a runway incursion. Runway incursions continue to threaten aviation safety during takeoff, approach, and ground operations. Takeoff, approach, landing, and taxiway clearances are typically issued by an air traffic controller via a voice (radio) channel, in conjunction with airport signs and airport surface lighting, such as runway lights and taxiway lights. To assist in the safe and orderly flow of traffic, the airport surface lighting can be dynamically controlled to signal an aircraft concerning its clearance instructions. Though several autonomous systems exist today, human errors due to poor visibility, fatigue, lack of position awareness, misunderstood air traffic control (ATC) clearances, multiple or conflicting ATC clearances, or inadvertent flight-deck distractions remain a distinct possibility.
In the terminal area, an aircrew is constantly listening to ATC communications designated for the ownship and also surrounding traffic. These communications assist the aircrew in building a mental picture of the surrounding environment, and they also allow the aircrew to anticipate and comprehend the intended action to be taken by other aircraft in the area. At many airports, there exist various discrete radio communications frequencies for communications with various ATC positions, such as the ground controller, the tower (local) controller, and the approach controller. Based on the current phase of the flight mission (taxi, approach, takeoff, etc.), it is possible that different aircraft are interested in and are tuned to any of these communications channels. A safe taxi, takeoff, or landing requires careful coordination between different controllers and the aircrew of any aircraft in the area. In such a scenario, when a given runway is of interest to multiple aircraft for their current flight mission phase, it becomes difficult for the aircrew to measure the intent of the surrounding traffic, and it may also be risky for the aircrew to solely rely on ATC communications or surface lighting systems to execute the flight mission.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for improved incursion detection systems and intuitive display systems, and aircraft display methods, that assist in reducing the incidence of runway incursions. These display methods should take into account both ground-based lighting systems and air traffic control communications on various air traffic control frequencies. It would thus be desirable to provide an autonomous system that can listen and correlate communications information from the various airport traffic controllers on their respective radio communications channels, and other sources, to present to the aircrew with an intuitive display of the runway status. Such a system undoubtedly would increase pilot efficiency, increase situational awareness, and improve safe and efficient terminal area operations by automatically processing voice instructions from multiple channel sources and identifying the relevant instructions affecting the ownship aircraft. The system should utilize all the benefits of voice communications and offer pilots with relevant and intuitive instructions, in the form of a flight deck display and alerting system, about possible conflicts or incursion threats for the safe execution of a flight mission. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the disclosure will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background of the disclosure.